timer did, the restless
excitement of both, and how they appeared to be sustaining and
encouraging one another, and yet, when the important sentence came which
left them without so much as a shilling, how bravely and soberly they
took it, without the least betrayal of mortified feeling, without any
change of countenance or even of attitude.

Valentine had often heard his father say that he had no expectations
from his mother, that he was quite sure the property never would come to
him. He had believed this, and excepting that he found the preamble of
the will solemn and the reading impressive, he did not take any special
interest in it.

Every shilling and every acre were left to little Peter Melcombe, his
mother being appointed his sole guardian till he reached the age of
twelve years, and a request being added that her dear son Daniel would
see to the repairing of the house, and the setting in order of the
garden and woodland.

"And yet not a shilling left to either of them," thought John. "I always
fancied there was some estrangement--felt sure of it; but if my father
and uncle were so far friendly with their mother that she could ask this
favour, how odd that she leaves nothing, not so much as a remembrance,
to either of them! The eldest son, by all accounts, was a very violent,
overbearing man; I've heard my father say as much; but he has been dead
so long that, if there was any estrangement on his account, they must
have made it up long ago."

And now the funeral was over. John Mortimer, taking the youth with him,
was walking about among the pear-trees close to the garden-wall, and the
two old brothers, who appeared to have a dislike to being separated,
even for a moment, were leisurely walking on, and in silence looking
about them.

"I should like to get into the garden," said John Mortimer; "here's a
door."

"But it's locked," remarked Valentine, "and Mrs. Peter Melcombe told me
yesterday that none of them ever walked in it."

"Ah, indeed!" said John carelessly--he was far from giving a literal
meaning to the information. "It looks a rotten old thing," he continued;
"the key is in the house, no doubt, but I don't want to have the trouble
of going in to ask for it."

"Perhaps it's not locked," said Valentine; "perhaps it only wants a
push."

John and Valentine were standing among some cherry-trees, which, being
thickly laden with their blossom, screened them from observation as far
as the windows of